


Chance

by malsseong



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-16
Updated: 2015-03-16
Packaged: 2018-03-18 05:38:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3558122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malsseong/pseuds/malsseong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From a Tumblr prompt: On her journey to Polis, Clarke finds Lexa as the only wounded survivor of a mysterious attack on her grounder group on their way to Polis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chance

She noticed the way the dirt on the path had darkened as if wet. But it’s only once she spots the severed hand laying in a tuft of grass that she realises she’s been walking along a trail of blood for the past 50 paces or so. Glancing around, she realises with stomach-churning suddenness that the dark shapes between the path and the woods aren’t rocks but bodies, crumpled to the ground in lifeless, bloody heaps.

She draws her gun, and steps gingerly off the path.

The first body she comes to, she uses a foot pressed into a shoulder to roll it onto its back.

Her hands clench involuntarily, and she’s barely able to still her trigger finger before inadvertently letting off a shot.

The face is blood-smeared, matted hair falling over one eye. She can’t put a name to the face, but it’s definitely someone she’d seen around the Grounder camp. Someone she’d seen right before they turned around and walked away from Mount Weather.

She chokes back the bile rising in her throat and moves to the next body, rolling it over with far more deference now that she knows who these people are. Who these people were.

 

She has no idea how long she’s been searching through the throng of bodies. But she’s worked up a sweat, and her hands are so covered in blood that she can’t get a grip on the shoulder in front of her.

Her hand slips, pulling back with unrestrained force and gliding swiftly across the edge of the blade protruding from the shoulder. She can feel the blade cut through the flesh of her palm, but it’s too sharp for the wound to hurt right away.

She wipes her hands on the damp grass, then redoubles her efforts, pulling as hard as she can on the shoulder; the body begins to move just as her hands slip on the blood, and she stumbles backwards, landing on her ass. She had intended to lay the body on its side, conscious of the sword impaled through the shoulder. But she pulled with too much force, and the body collapses backwards, driving the sword deeper in.

Clarke’s muttered “shit!” is almost enough to drown out the soft groan of pain.

But she hears it, barely, and scrambles onto her knees, darting forwards.

She stops dead when she recognises the face, even as it’s turned away from her.

There’s a small cough, and blood seeping between full lips, and suddenly she’s in motion again.

Before she really knows what she’s doing, she’s torn the shirt off one of the bodies beside her and is trying to use it to staunch the wound where her clumsy actions had made it bleed anew.  
She’s barely able to focus on the task; her gaze keeps darting back to fluttering eyelids, pale skin, and lips she’d been kissing barely a day ago.

When she has the bleeding under control, she allows her fingers to brush the hair away from the ashen face in front of her, and gently press her lips against a disturbingly cold cheek.

“Come on, Lexa,” she whispers against the other woman’s skin.

She wants to say more, but the words won’t form.

***

The first thing she does is build a fire. The sun is beginning to go down, and soon the cold will set in.

She wants to build the fire as far away from the other bodies as she can, but Lexa certainly can’t walk, and she’s not strong enough to carry her.

So she sets up on the other side of the path. She can still smell the blood in the air, but the gentle slope from the path down to the woods puts them at such an angle as to hide the bodies.

When the fire is starting to crackle, she begins the arduous task of moving the brunette. It’s only 200 paces, but Lexa is heavy — and, in her current state, completely unable to help — and the blood makes it impossible for Clarke to get a decent grip, and the sword still protruding from Lexa’s shoulder makes the position awkward.

The Commander’s heels drag along the ground, snagging in divots and on the limbs of bodies — of the bodies of Lexa’s people, who she gave everything to save. Clarke tries desperately not to think about that.

She has to stop half a dozen times, and by the time they reach the fire, the sun has completely set below the tree line.

She sets Lexa on her side, careful of the sword still protruding from her flesh, pulls a burning stick from the fire, and crosses back to the other side of the path, the flame held high above her head as she uses the flickering light to search for other survivors.  
It takes her far longer than she should to check all the bodies, because she keeps returning to Lexa to check that she’s still breathing.

As she weaves her way through the sea of lifeless Grounders, she collects anything useful from them, barely refraining herself from whispering apologies every time she takes an item.

She grabs shirts, and belts. A satchel filled with food, a waterskin, a metal container she can use to heat water. Several heavy fur coats.

She drops her supplies in a heap by the fire, sorting through them.

With a fistful of fabric in one hand, and her other on the hilt of the sword, she presses a kiss to Lexa’s cheek, whispers an apology, and pulls the sword as hard as she can.

Lexa releases a groan that, even unconscious, sounds tortured. Clarke presses the fabric to the wound, tosses the sword to the side, grabs another handful of fabric, and presses it against the wound on Lexa’s back.

***

By the time the bleeding finally stops, her arms are exhausted from applying constant pressure.

She stokes the fire, lays her gun within easy reach, and slides her body as close as she can get it to Lexa’s, pulling the furs tighter around their bodies.

***

When Lexa’s eyes finally flutter open, the sun is high in the sky, and Clarke has been cradling the brunette’s head in her lap since the last time she had to get up to stoke the fire.

Her fingers still in thick brown hair as she watches green eyes flicker around, taking in every tiny piece of information.

Her gaze stops on Clarke, and a small smile pulls at her lips.

“How’s your shoulder?” Clarke asks.

Lexa’s smile stretches wider, as her eyelids droop. “Hurts,” she mutters, then her lips relax in sleep.


End file.
